1 . Life is full of ups and downs, and you must understand that you will sometimes fail at things and it is okay when that happens. Almost all of our life we have been taught that failure is really bad, and when we fail we must drown (沉浸) ourselves in sorrow, this is an entirely wrong approach.
From a kid to an adult, you will fail at many things in life but that will only tell you about yourself. You will get to learn about your true capabilities, the things you are good at, and the things that you are bad at. We must learn to accept the process rather than run from it. Only then will we be able to achieve our goals in life.
Let me tell you something about myself, and how I faced failures in life. In my early years at school, I had trouble with some subjects. I used to get really bad grades. Sometimes I would get an F and that would make me really scared. I used to think: “What will I show my parents?” So what I used to do was cover those grades up. I would turn the F into a B just to please my parents. Well the short version of it is that it didn’t work out and eventually, I was caught doing that. I learned a lot after that. I knew that I had to accept that failure and learn from it, and something good actually came from it. I started doing better with my grades. That F turned into a B naturally, and that B turned into an A.
Whenever you face a failure, never think that you are never going to recover from this. You must think of ways to better yourself. Did you know that it took Thomas Edison 10,000 attempts to perfect the light bulb? Bill Gates failed many times, even his first company was a complete failure. All of this is proof that we must learn from our failures, not run from them!
1. What agrees with the author’s attitude to failure?| A．It should be a painful process for us. | B．It is a way to tell us about our abilities. |
| C．It’s better to find ways to escape from it. | D．Smart people can find ways to avoid it. |
| A．To tell us we can cover our mistakes sometimes. |
| B．To tell us almost everyone will make mistakes. |
| C．To show the right attitudes to failure is crucial. |
| D．To explain everyone will succeed with devotion. |
| A．Slow but sure wins the race. | B．Good beginning is half done. |
| C．Failure is the mother of success. | D．Where there is a will there is a way. |
| A．Clever. | B．Careful. | C．Caring. | D．Optimistic. |
2 . I grew up with my identical twin. One thing about being a
When I became a psychologist, I began to
I was at my friends’ house, and their five-year-old was standing on a stool (凳子), brushing his teeth. His skin on his leg was
We
It’s time we made our physical and our psychological
| A．hero | B．twin | C．winner | D．artist |
| A．weak | B．tired | C．upset | D．embarrassed |
| A．notice | B．doubt | C．worry | D．deny |
| A．fuel | B．value | C．defend | D．affect |
| A．private | B．real | C．potential | D．responsible |
| A．burned | B．twisted | C．damaged | D．dirtied |
| A．made up | B．went in | C．watched out | D．reached out |
| A．readily | B．voluntarily | C．hardly | D．carefully |
| A．avoid | B．cover | C．expose | D．hide |
| A．dislike | B．escape | C．suffer | D．overcome |
| A．fear | B．hug | C．ignore | D．mistake |
| A．treat | B．discover | C．predict | D．replace |
| A．keep it up | B．check it out | C．work it out | D．shake it off |
| A．leg | B．head | C．back | D．arm |
| A．benefit | B．health | C．wealth | D．fame |
3 . In a small village there lived a lazy Brahmin Ramdas. He would do nothing but daydream all day. One sunny afternoon, Ramdas was very
“It is this pot of milk that is going to make me
“How
Deep in his
Laziness is the biggest
| A．hungry | B．angry | C．sick | D．curious |
| A．sell | B．beat | C．beg | D．entertain |
| A．money | B．soup | C．water | D．milk |
| A．wealthy | B．happy | C．famous | D．strange |
| A．lucky | B．capable | C．interested | D．particular |
| A．road | B．hotel | C．market | D．shop |
| A．changed | B．continued | C．paused | D．stopped |
| A．kids | B．huts | C．arguments | D．wounds |
| A．generous | B．handsome | C．brave | D．smart |
| A．bathe | B．exercise | C．sweep | D．surf |
| A．ideas | B．opinions | C．thoughts | D．expressions |
| A．heart | B．pot | C．ghee | D．goal |
| A．sadness | B．laziness | C．carelessness | D．anxiety |
| A．success | B．aim | C．partner | D．enemy |
| A．robber | B．thief | C．murderer | D．visitor |
4 . Twelve-year-old Catherine has a lot of friends—632, actually, if you count up her online friends. And she spends a lot of time with them.
But is it possible that Catherine’s online friendships could be making her lonely? That’s what some experts believe. Connecting online is a great way to stay in touch, they say. However, some experts worry that many kids are so busy connecting online that they might be missing out on true friendships.
Could this be true? During your parents’ childhoods, connecting with friends usually meant spending time with them in the flesh. Kids played Scrabble around a table, not words with friends on their phones. When friends missed each other, they picked up the telephone. Friends might even write letters to each other.
Today, most communication takes place online. A typical teen sends 2,000 texts a month and spends more than 44 hours per week in front of a screen. Much of this time is spent on social media platform.
In fact, in many ways, online communication can make friendships stronger. “There’s definitely a positive influence. Kids can stay in constant contact, which means they can share more of their feelings with each other,” says Katie Davis, co-author of The App Generation.
Other experts, however, warn that too much online communication can get in the way of forming deep friendships. “If we are constantly checking in with our virtual world, we will have little time for our real-world friendships,” says Larry Rosen, a professor at California State University. Rosen also worries that today’s kids might mistake the “friends” on the social media for true friends in life. However, in tough times, you don’t need anyone to like your picture or share your blogs. You need someone who will keep your secrets and hold your hand. You would like to talk face to face.
1. What is the purpose of the first paragraph?| A．To tell about true friends. | B．To start a discussion. |
| C．To encourage online friendships. | D．To summarize(总结) the text. |
| A．In any case. | B．In public. | C．In person. | D．In advance. |
| A．Unconcerned. | B．Positive. | C．Worried. | D．Confused. |
| A．Teenagers need to focus on real-world friendships. | B．It’s easier to develop friendships in real life. |
| C．It’s wise to turn to friends online. | D．Social media help people stay closely connected. |
5 . A man was exploring some caves by the seashore. In one cave he
As he walked along the beach he
Sometimes it’s like that with
| A．searched | B．lost | C．made | D．found |
| A．rolled | B．pressed | C．dug | D．cut |
| A．dangerous | B．valuable | C．annoying | D．ordinary |
| A．pushed | B．put | C．threw | D．pulled |
| A．little | B．long | C．hard | D．well |
| A．Moved | B．Satisfied | C．Worried | D．Excited |
| A．given | B．taken | C．left | D．dropped |
| A．hidden | B．obvious | C．well-known | D．questionable |
| A．forgot | B．missed | C．abandoned | D．faced |
| A．money | B．life | C．people | D．friends |
| A．pity | B．blame | C．ignore | D．hate |
| A．warm-hearted | B．honest | C．famous | D．stylish |
| A．clay | B．treasure | C．ball | D．shell |
| A．come off | B．break away | C．run out | D．dry up |
| A．normally | B．gradually | C．wonderfully | D．expensively |
6 . One night several years ago, after filling up my car at a gas station and pulling away, I notice a strange sound behind me in I traffic. It sounded to me like someone was dragging a bumper (保险杆) , so I started looking for the car to alert the driver. But no matter how fast or slow I moved, or where I turned, I couldn’t locate the car.
At this point I noticed people on the sidewalk pointing and laughing at me. I stopped and found the gas hose (软管) still attached to my car. I immediately pull out the hose and drove back to the gas station, where I was educated on the economics of breaking a gas pump (泵) .
My memory of that night is odd because I was judging the behavior of another person, who then turned out to be me. Philosophers might say that in these rare minutes, my “I-self” (the seer of things around me) and “me-self” (the one seen) were mentally separated.
This kind of separation is unnatural. Making it your permanent state of mind would be difficult and perhaps even undesirable. Each of us can, however, purposely change the balance of time we spend as observers and as the object of observation—even without doing something as ridiculous as I did. And working to observe more than you think about being observed can be an excellent way to get happier.
We think constantly about how other see us; we look in every mirror; we check our mentions on social media; we obsess over our identity. This brings trouble. Research has shown, for example, that focusing on the world outside yourself is linked to happiness, while focusing on yourself and how others see you can lead to your moods going up and down like a yo-yo. The good news is that you can certainly increasing your happiness by adopting conscious practices that help lower the mount of time you spend in an objectified state.
1. What happened to the author that night?| A．He was probably fined. | B．He damaged the bumper. |
| C．He got trapped in traffic. | D．He knocked into the sidewalk. |
| A．The hose. | B．The people. | C．The author. | D．The pump. |
| A．Separate yourselves from the outside. | B．Spend more time being an observer. |
| C．Avoid being an object of observation. | D．Work bard to increase happiness. |
| A．How to be aware of happiness. | B．How to spend our spare time. |
| C．How to reduce the state of “me-self”. | D．How to adjust our moods. |
7 . At the beginning of graduate school, I knew that if I wanted to get tenure (长期聘用), I had to be productive. However, when my first three papers were rejected by major journals, a leading expert told me my projects were hopeless, and I wondered if I should drop out.
We all get rejected at work, whether it’s having our suggestions shot down or getting fired from a job. It causes pain. Neuroscientists (神经系统科学家) have scanned the brains of people who have cruelly been excluded from an online game. The physiological (生理学的) response looks fairly similar to processing physical pain.
Apparently, this was adaptive in our evolutionary past. If rejection didn’t hurt, you might have been perfectly comfortable leaving your tribe, which would not be good for your survival. But it’s left us nervous and likely to overreact to everyday rejections. If you’ve ever given a presentation and felt upset by the one unfriendly face in a room full of smiles, you know what I mean.
That’s the bad news. The good news is that we can learn to accept rejection calmly. “When you’re insecure in one, you rely on the other one that’s doing better at that time. Pliability (柔韧性) is the definition of strength,” said filmmaker M. Night Shyamalan.
When my work got rejected early in my academic career, pliability became my source of strength. My identity as a researcher was under threat, but that wasn’t what had drawn me to graduate school in the first place. I had another, stronger identity: I wanted to be a teacher. However, I hadn’t had the chance: The first two years of my program were supposed to focus entirely on research.
I realized that if I wanted to bounce back from the research rejections, I had to find a way to teach. I convinced an adviser to sign off on independent study projects for a group of students, and I started meeting with them weekly to teach my own little class. The conversations with the students gave rise to my first two major papers, which gave me a head start toward tenure.
1. What was the author’s reaction to the leading expert’s words?| A．He took his advice. | B．He felt discouraged. |
| C．He paid no attention. | D．He consulted another expert. |
| A．Rejection really hurts. |
| B．Rejection is important to survival. |
| C．People tend to overreact to rejection. |
| D．Physical pain grows because of rejection. |
| A．Find out the reasons behind it. |
| B．Forgive those who reject us. |
| C．Turn to our stronger identity. |
| D．Learn a lesson from past failures. |
| A．He left graduate school. |
| B．He turned into a middle school teacher. |
| C．He worked on practicing his physical pliability. |
| D．He accomplished some research work successfully. |
8 . Like many eco-conscious films, I’ve seen Don’t Look Up many times, and shown it to my friends and family whenever anyone suggests a movie night. I rarely pass up the moment to educate my loved ones on any possible disaster or crisis in an entertaining or thought-inspiring way. It’s a refreshing break from the usual doom-mongering that conversations can often get into. The power of cinema in communicating the climate crisis plays a critical role in affecting public attitudes and behaviors in relation to environmental justice.
Films appeal to our emotions in a way scientific presentation, academic papers or broadcast interview rarely can. Accordingly, films have an unusual way of engaging our emotions, which is a vital step in driving changes in people’s behavior. Films can make full use of this by presenting climate messages within fantastic narratives (叙述) that seasoned movie watchers will be familiar with. In the case of Don’t Look Up, it’s about meteor (流星) strikes. For The End We Start From, it’s extreme flooding. In First Reformed, climate activism is the predominant focus.
Films and TV dramas can also bring the vastness of climate disaster down to earth by integrating everyday events. The TV series Years and Years, launches climate issues into public debate, helping viewers relate to the characters’ experiences. The End We Start From, set in an extreme flood in London, follows the everyday experience of having a newborn child. This creates a heart-felt emotional connect ion between the themes of the film and the viewers’ own experiences. The Day After Tomorrow, the first hit released in 2004, enhances public awareness and concern through its vivid imagery of environmental disaster.
Films like this generate a strong empathetic (同理心的) connect ion that can help people change the way they behave far more than facts and data can. Of course, the growing type of climate change cinema is not always scientifically accurate. But if cinema is to be used more forcefully as a tool to raise the public awareness of climate crisis, then accuracy is not entirely necessary: it is the emotional connection and thrilling storytelling that are most crucial.
1. What does the underlined word “doom-mongering” probably mean?| A．Misfortune. | B．Imbalance. | C．Disbelief. | D．Irrelevance. |
| A．They can change environmental efforts. | B．They can uniquely create emotional link. |
| C．They can help viewers out of their trouble. | D．They can solve social issues academically. |
| A．By inferring results. | B．By analyzing reasons. |
| C．By giving examples. | D．By making comparisons. |
| A．Disaster films are educational and entertaining. |
| B．Scientific accuracy is a necessity for disaster films. |
| C．The growing popularity of cinema is not desirable. |
| D．Public awareness of entertainment needs raising. |
9 . I remember when I was young, people often asked me, “What are you going to be when you grow up?”
It
We find ourselves just about reaching the top, and a “small”
I always tell my children that you are
So, be true to your dream, and don’t let anyone
| A．kept on | B．insisted on | C．felt like | D．started out |
| A．changed | B．planned | C．failed | D．left |
| A．doctor | B．engineer | C．musician | D．teacher |
| A．But | B．Or | C．So | D．As |
| A．aim | B．agreement | C．decision | D．position |
| A．hardly | B．nearly | C．slightly | D．extremely |
| A．money | B．plan | C．dreams | D．friends |
| A．greatest | B．poorest | C．tallest | D．oldest |
| A．themselves | B．itself | C．yourselves | D．ourselves |
| A．sound | B．noise | C．speech | D．voice |
| A．it | B．her | C．him | D．me |
| A．can | B．can’t | C．must | D．mustn’t |
| A．where | B．who | C．when | D．which |
| A．stages | B．lessons | C．suggestions | D．choices |
| A．to | B．for | C．at | D．with |
| A．able | B．ready | C．likely | D．happy |
| A．interesting | B．important | C．impossible | D．necessary |
| A．many | B．some | C．any | D．no |
| A．spending | B．living | C．planning | D．changing |
| A．buy | B．fool | C．steal | D．borrow |
10 . Like many new graduates, I left university full of hope for the future but with no real idea of what I wanted to do. My degree, with honors, in English literature had not really prepared me for anything practical. I knew I wanted to make a difference in the world somehow, but I had no idea how to do that. That’s when I learned about the Lighthouse Project.
I started my journey as a Lighthouse Project volunteer by reading as much as I could about the experiences of previous volunteers. I knew it would be a lot of hard work, and that I would be away from my family and friends for a very long time. In short, I did not take my decision to apply for the Lighthouse Project lightly. Neither did my family.
Eventually, however, I won the support of my family, and I sent in all the paperwork needed for the application. After countless interviews and presentations, I managed to stand out among the candidates and survive the test alone. Several months later, I finally received a call asking me to report for duty. I would be going to a small village near Abuja, Nigeria. Where? What? Nigeria? I had no idea. But I was about to find out.
After completing my training, I was sent to the village that was small and desperately in need of proper accommodation. Though the local villagers were poor, they offered their homes, food, and hearts as if I were their own family. I was asked to lead a small team of local people in building a new schoolhouse. For the next year or so, I taught in that same schoolhouse. But I sometimes think I learned more from my students than they did from me.
Sometime during that period, I realized that all those things that had seemed so strange or unusual to me no longer did, though I did not get anywhere with the local language, and returned to the United States a different man. The Lighthouse Project had changed my life forever.
1. Why did the writer enter for the Lighthouse Project?| A．Because his major was connected with it. |
| B．Because he was extremely familiar with it. |
| C．Because he wanted to make the world a better place. |
| D．Because new graduates had to work for it after graduation. |
| A．Awkward. | B．Complex. |
| C．Entertaining. | D．Effortless. |
| A．Working as a teacher. |
| B．Helping villagers build hospitals. |
| C．Raising money for his students. |
| D．Inviting locals to enter his Project. |
| A．A Life-changing Voluntary Experience |
| B．The Memorable and Rewarding life in Abuja |
| C．Lighthouse Project—The Promise of African Education |
| D．Lighthouse Project—a Volunteer Organization for New Graduates |
